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Tuesday, 9 July 2013

If I'm yelling at the TV, it must be an election year.

I wasn't going to write about politics again. But it's all that's in my brain today. It was all the tweeting during last night's episode of Q & A and being home today with the radio on and reading Kerry-Anne Walsh's book, The Stalking of Julia Gillard...so here we are.

This week's new Prime Minister, Kevin Rudd, has announced a proposal to reform the Australian Labor Party's rules governing the election of leader, putting more power in the hands of members. Ordinarily I'd be thinking this is a good thing, but its announcement was tainted when Rudd stated it would prevent a leader being told, "OK sunshine, it's over."

This little post-script made it clear that the rush of reformist's zeal gripping the nation's PM had less to do with democracy and was more about himself; after all, he's had the last three years to raise such ideas. If they'd been adopted though, Julia Gillard may still be Prime Minister which wouldn't have been very convenient for Rudd.

Thought I'd share my tweets from last night when there was a lot of discussion about the proposed changes.

9:45pm: Unions are made up of ordinary working people. Don't get much more grassroots than that v #qanda

That was in response to Malcolm Turnbull's assertions that the Liberal Party is a grassroots party.

9:48pm: Is now the time to talk about a Republic where we can truly choose our head of state? #qanda

Again, in response to cries about the Australian people's "right" to choose our Prime Minister. We don't have that right. We elect a local member to the House of Representatives. The party which has the most local members wins government! Whoever is the leader of the party with the most members is the Prime Minister. The leader of the both major parties is chosen by a collegiate vote of the parliamentary party. Last time I checked.

Six months ago I had never heard the term "symmetrical broadband", now the lack of it keeps me awake at night. Malcolm Turnbull's belief that there isn't a need for fast speeds for both upload and download to the internet is just plain wrong. A mental health education program I am currently managing provides education to nursing, medical and allied health students in a regional area. We currently limp along on domestic broadband and often the service fails. This needs to be fixed.

Ok, this one was lost in translation. As they talked about opposition plans to tackle climate change by killing emissions trading and introducing a green army, I visualised the green army turning on the government demanding action. See the link?

10:30pm: The questions are making more sense than the answers tonight. #qanda

I tuned out, frustrated at the lack of clarity in thought, speech and action.

So that was my night. No tweets up on the screen this week (I had one the previous week). It's an interesting way to interact and see others' reactions.